


how dare you trust fate - she's not that kind

by nosecoffee



Category: Lord of the Flies - William Golding
Genre: Canon Time Period, Denial, Dreams, Flashbacks, Guilt, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, M/M, Nightmares, Post canon, This is vaguely a fix-it fic but barely, blame
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-16
Updated: 2017-02-16
Packaged: 2018-09-24 22:00:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9788978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nosecoffee/pseuds/nosecoffee
Summary: "I was put on this earth solely to wreck every good thing you ever do. I'm here to destroy you."He smiles that feral smile and something dark twists in Ralph's gut at the memory of that grin in the firelight, another time Jack had roared the same words, a spear in his hand, paint on his skin.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Title from 'a non love song from Nashville' by Dodie Clark
> 
> I was very tempted to name this "this will all just end in flames" for the reference and because it's from the same song but I refrained

Ralph doesn't want to remember, he decides one night. They're still on the ship, a day from land, a day from their homes.

Ralph cannot sleep.

He's still waiting to close his eyes and open them and be on the island again.

He clutches his pillow to his chest, curled around it like it's a lifeline.

The sooner he's home, the sooner he can forget.

Because he doesn't want to remember. Not really.

~

All returns to almost normal.

His parents - his father fresh from overseas, his mother red-eyed - usher him away from the rest of the boys, take him home and hold him in their arms by the fire in the evening.

Ralph goes to bed, but he cannot sleep.

Images still haunt him.

The beast in the tree. The pigs head on a stick. Piggy's crushed glasses. The shattered conch shell.

The fire as it engulfed the island.

Ralph cries because he doesn't know how to forget, to sleep, to live.

A boy of twelve should not have to want to forget a thing.

~

And, eventually, his prayers are answered.

At some point in wishing that he could find some peace, Ralph begins to forget certain details.

The exact shade of pink the platform was. The sound of Piggy's voice. The smell of rotting flesh and buzzing of flies around the man in the parachute.

Ralph begins to forget.

It's almost a miracle.

Almost.

In his dreams, Ralph still sees a red-headed boy who had smiled at him in shy liking at the start. The boy who had protested loudly at being called his Christian name. The boy who had put a price on his head and chased him through the jungle with spears.

With malice.

Ralph cannot remember the boys name.

He doesn't know that he wants to as the dream slips through his fingers when he wakes, unsure as to what exactly he wanted to remember.

~

People in his little village still stare at him, point occasionally, whispering, "He's the one from the accident."

Ralph becomes used to it (though not entirely sure to just which accident they are referring) as he gets older.

The war ends and it seems like the perfect ending, but Ralph feels something nagging at the back of his brain. Something telling him that all is not yet right with the world.

The red-headed boy in his dreams, the one with the feral smile and the calloused hands, offers no answer.

Ralph starts to forget him too.

~

Ralph is twenty-one years old when he moves to London.

The itchy, claustrophobic town offers no respite anymore, and his parents watch him with sad eyes at dinner as he hums. As if they're expecting him to start crying.

He finds himself a flat. It's his, and he needs to find a job to pay the rent.

He ends up in a bar a couple blocks down and catches the eye of the owner.

~

It's 1965, two years since Ralph moved to London, when he runs into somebody unexpected.

As it turns out, the red-headed boy - the one with the black cloak and the eyes that burn his own like fire on a long-forgotten island - the one from his dreams, is real.

Ralph very nearly drops a glass in surprise but doesn't. Catches himself on the bar.

The boy - the man - meets his eyes and it's like the world stops.

Ralph knows him.

Cannot place him.

Ralph knew him.

Does not - cannot - no - Simon- _Piggy-_

Jack.

That's when he drops a glass.

~

("And here I thought Simon was the one who was always fainting?")

~

Ralph doesn't want to wake up.

If he wakes up, he makes this real.

If he wakes up, he admits that he's been denying the accident for years.

Ralph doesn't want to wake up and have to look Jack in they eyes after spending years dreaming about him and wondering who he was.

Ralph feels that he is on the edge of unconsciousness.

He clings to it, but he slips like a boulder off a cliff.

~

Jack wants to talk about it just as much as Ralph does.

Not at all.

They're staring at the table, at each other's hands, not at each other, not speaking.

Ralph hates it.

Knows he cannot leave.

Jack - his only solace in a world of pain and confusion - the centre of his pain and confusion, is the only thing tying him to that terrible time.

Eleven years on and they cannot even look at each other.

If he can sever this link, Ralph can live in resolute peace.

Of course, he'll still know what happened, he can't take back the realisation of something he's been denying since he was a little boy, but it's better than nothing.

"I don't know what to say,"  
Jack says and Ralph thinks 'yes, I do remember you'. Heard his voice, and remembers that same voice ordering boys across the sand in black cloaks and orderly lines, a bit higher than it is today.

Remembers that voice shouting after him through the burning palms.

"An apology would be nice." Ralph says for lack of anything better to say.

Jack chokes on a laugh. "Oh god." He sips his beer. "What have you been doing?"

Ralph gestures generally around the bar. "Working. Sleeping. Denying the fact that I was ever crashed on an island full of savage little boys."

Jack breathes in shakily. Ralph would feel bad if he didn't remember what happened to every boy under Jack's rule, under the weight of his decisions.

Ralph can't remember the number of boys who had been there, but he doubts it would be hard to run into them in a town like this.

"I actually forgot for a few years there. Didn't want to remember what you did. What I did. Didn't want to. Couldn't. You just had to wreck everything again, didn't you?"

"That's me, Ralph." Jack replies, and puts a hand on Ralph's own. Ralph finally looks up, into the dark eyes of the boy in his dreams. The boy of his dreams and his nightmares. "I was put on this earth solely to wreck every good thing you ever do. I'm here to destroy you."

He smiles that feral smile and something dark twists in Ralph's gut at the memory of that grin in the firelight, another time Jack had roared the same words, a spear in his hand, paint on his skin.

"I don't ever want to see you again." Ralph mutters and pulls his hand away, getting up from his chair.

Jack's face doesn't change. "That's fair. Good night, Ralph."

~

Ralph wonders if Piggy would be angry at Ralph for not throttling Jack on the spot.

Ralph wonders what Piggy's real name was.

He calls his parents that night.

~

He sees Jack again a week later.

Same red hair, same feral grin, same look of terror and guilt in his dark, dark eyes.

He serves him a beer and wipes the counter like a cliché bartender in an old movie.

"I told you I didn't want to see you again." Ralph says.

"I said I understood that," Jack replies, "I never said I accepted it."

Ralph scowls at the red-headed man. "I hate you."

"I know." Jack grins.

There is silence for a moment while Ralph tends to other customers and Jack starts on his drink.

"Do you get nightmares?" Ralph asks when he returns.

Jack doesn't ever twitch. "Oh, always. You?"

Ralph shrugs. "Flashbacks, dreams. Never graphic. I guess I'm not good with detail."

"You know, I think the littluns-" the word does on his tongue, and Ralph watches wetness enter Jacks eyes, hears his throat stick. "The - er - kids. I think they got off best. They forget easy. They probably hardly remember, same as you did a week ago."

"I'd kill to have never have been on that plane."

Jack sips his beer and grimaces. "I did. Didn't do me too much good, did it?"

"No." Ralph agrees.

~

Jack is a common visitor after that.

They don't talk much when he's there, but when they do, it's almost always related to the island. Always something along the lines of "if we were there now, we'd be so much better at keeping order" or "I wish it had never happened" or "I wish you were dead".

The last one is reserved for Ralph when he's drunk off his ass. The reply is almost always 'me too'.

Ralph doesn't know when they stop being verbal therapy for each other and start up a meek friendship with each other.

Ralph doesn't really care.

~

Ralph has a nightmare and cannot bare the pain.

He dresses quickly - not right, he's wearing odd socks and a cardigan with too many holes - and walks out into the cold night.

Jack gave him his address - "For emergencies." - and Ralph follows it blindly in the dark.

He knocks on the flat door. Almost a minute later, Jack opens the door and Ralph throws himself into the other boy's - man's - arms.

"Ralph-"

He presses his lips to Jack's - full, and vaguely chapped, and parted in surprise, and oh-so sickeningly sweet.

"Just make me feel real. Remind me I'm here. I can't take it."

Jack has never been good at taking orders, but Ralph supposes there must always be exceptions.

~

He wakes up with his head pillowed on Jack's arm.

He's not too fussed about that.

He can live with that, even if there's not much else he can live with.

Fin.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading this, I hope you enjoyed. If you did, please feel free to leave a comment and/or a kudos, and track me down on Tumblr @nose-coffee. Again, thank you!


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